This survey characterizes an emerging research area, sometimes called coordination theory , that focuses on the interdisciplinary study of coordination. Research in this area uses and extends ideas about coordination from disciplines such as computer science, organization theory, operations research, economics, linguistics, and psychology. A key insight of the framework ...
Title:
The interdisciplinary study of
coordination
CCS:
Cooperation and
coordination
Keywords:
coordination theory
coordination coordination science
Abstract:
<par>This survey characterizes an emerging research area, sometimes called <italic>
coordination theory</italic>, that focuses on the interdisciplinary study of
coordination. ... . Research in this area uses and extends ideas about
coordination from disciplines such as computer science, organization theory, operations research, ... psychology.</par>
<par>A key insight of the framework presented here is that
coordination can be seen as the process of <italic>managing dependencies</italic> among ... possible by characterizing different kinds of dependencies and identifying the
coordination processes that can be used to manage them. A variety ... constraints</italic>, and <italic>task/subtask dependencies</italic>.</par>
<par>Section 3 summarizes ways of applying a
coordination perspective in three different domains:(1) understanding the effects of information ...
Primary CCS:
Cooperation and
coordination
References:
CARRIERO, N. AND GELERNTER, D. 1989.
Coordination languages and their significance. Working Paper YALEU/DCS/RR-716. New Haven, CT: Dept. of Computer Science, Yale Univ. New Haven, Conn.]]
CHANDLER, A.D. 1977. Administrative
coordination, allocation and monitoring: Concepts and comparisons. Working paper 77-21. European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management, Brussels.]]
CROWSTON, K. 1991. Towards a
coordination cookbook. Recipes for multi-agent action. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT Sloan School of Management, Cambridge, Mass.]]
CURTIS, B. 1989. Modeling
coordination from field experiments. In Proceedings of the Conference on Organizational Computing,
Coordination and Collaboration: Theories and Technologies for Computer-Supported Work.]]
DURFEE, E. D. AND LESSER, V. R. 1987. Using partial global plans to
coordinate distributed problem solvers. In Proceedings of the lOth Internattonal Joint Conference on Art~ftctal Intelligence (IJCAL87}, 875 883.]]
HOLT, A.W. 1988. Diplans: A new language for the study and implementation of
coordination. ACM Trans. Office Inf. Syst. 6, 2, 109-125.]]
HOLT, A. W. 1980.
Coordinator programs. Unpublished Tech. Rep. Massachusetts Computer Associates, Inc., Wakefield, Mass.]]
HOLT, A W., RAMSEY, H. R., AND GRIMES, J. D. 1983.
Coordination system technology as the basis for a programming environment. Elec. Commun. 57, 4, 307-314.]]
MALONE, T.W. 1988. What is
coordination theory. Working Paper no. 2051-88. MIT Sloan School of Management, Cambridge, Mass.]]
MALONE, T. W. 1987. Modeling
coordination in organizations and markets. Manage. Sci. 33, 1317-1332.]]
MALONE, T. W. AND CROWSTON, K. G. 1991. Toward an interdisciplinary theory of
coordination. Tech. Rep. no. 120. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for
Coordination Science, Cambridge, Mass.]]
MALONE, T. W. AND CROWSTON, K. 1990. What is
coordination theory and how can it help design cooperative work systems. In Proceeding of the Third Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work. ACM Press, New York, 357-370.]]
NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 1991.
Coordination Theory and Collaboration Technology Workshop Summary (June 3-5). National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C.]]
NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 1989. Areport by the NSF-IRIS Review Panel for Research on
Coordination Theory and Technology. NSFF Forms and Pubhcation Unit, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C.]]
SINGH, B. 1992. Interconnected Roles (IR): A
coordinated model. Tech, Rep. CT-84-92. Microelectronics and Computer Technology Corp., Austin, Tex.]]
Full Text:
... name for this area, so we will use the term
coordination theory to refer to theories about how
coordination can occur in di- verse kinds of systems. We use ... steps along the path toward an emerg- ing theory of
coordination. . 1.1 A Motivating Question We begin with one of ... Motivating Question We begin with one of the questions that
coordination theory may help answer: How will the widespread use of ... together? This is not the only possi- ble focus of
coordination theory, but it is a particularly timely question today for ... of people to use computing and communications capabilities to help
coordinate their work. For example, specialized new software has been developed ... Surveys, Vol 26, No. 1. March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 89 usage as significant as the earlier shifts toward time ... guided by a coherent underly- ing theory of how people
coordinate their activities now and how they might do so differently ... magnitude- the constraints on how certain kinds of communication and
coordination can occur. At the same time, there is a pervasive ... shifting project teams. As another example, lowering the costs of
coordination between firms may encourage more market transactions (i.e., more ?buying? ... rather than ?mak- ing?) and, at the same time, closer
coordination across firm boundaries (such as ?just-in-time? inventory management). 1.2 How ... look more deeply into the funda- mental constraints on how
coordination can occur. And to imagine new kinds of organizational processes ... to imagine new possibilities-is to look for analogies in how
coordination occurs in very different kinds of systems. For example, could ... in distributed computer sys- tems that would illuminate possibilities for
coordination Might
coordination structures analogous to those used in bee hives or ant ... certain aspects of human organizations? And could lessons learned about
coordination in human systems help understand computational or biolog- ical systems, ... agenda for this new area. 2. A FRAMEWORK FOR STUDYING
COORDINATION 2.1 What is
Coordination? ? We all have an intuitive sense of what the ... coordi- nation is nearly invisible, and we some- times notice
coordination most clearly when it is lacking. When we spend hours ... we may become very aware of the effects of poor
coordination. . For many purposes, this intuitive meaning is sufficient. However, ... diversity of these defini- tions illustrates the difficulty of defining
coordination and also the variety of pos- sible starting points for ... is useful to begin with the following sim- ple definition:
Coordination is managing dependencies This definition is consistent with the simple ... Rockart and Short [1989] and Curtis [1989]. The importance of
coordination in this very general sense was perhaps first recognized by ... suggests, we believe it is helpful to use the word
coordination in a fairly inclusive sense. For instance, it is clear ...
... depen- dencies among activities, that is, as different forms of
coordination. . ACM Computing Surveys, Vol 26, No. 1, March 1994 ... Surveys, Vol 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 91 Table 1. Examples of Common Dependencies between Activities and ... Table 1. Examples of Common Dependencies between Activities and Alternative
Coordination Processes for Managing Them (Indentations in the left column indicate ... more specialized versions of general dependency types) Dependency Examples of
coordination processes for managing dependency Shared resources Transfer Usability "First come/first ... nation, we summarize in Appendix B examples of results about
coordination from computer science, organization the- ory, economics, and biology. Even ... and understanding them is usu- ally an important part of
coordination. . Even in human systems, however, analo- gies with other ... of systems may help us understand fundamental con- straints on
coordination and imagine new kinds of organizations that might be es- ... that might be es- pecially motivational for people. 2.2 Basic
Coordination Processes A primary vehicle for facilitating transfer among these different ... is to identify and study the basic processes involved in
coordination. . Are there fun- damental
coordination processes that oc- cur in all
coordinated systems? If so, how can we represent and analyze these ... ations in a way that helps generate and choose appropriate
coordination mecha- nisms for them? One of the advantages of the ... of the advantages of the definition we have used for
coordination is that it suggests a direction for addressing these questions. ... that it suggests a direction for addressing these questions. If
coordination is defined as managing dependencies, then further progress should be ... by charac- terizing different kinds of dependencies and identifying the
coordination pro- cesses that can be used to manage them. Table ... shared-resource constraints can be man- aged by a variety of
coordination pro- cesses such as ?first come/first serve,? priority order, budgets, ... we believe that one of the most intriguing possibilities for
coordination theory is t o identify and systematically analyze a wide ... systematically analyze a wide variety of dependencies and their associated
coordination pro- cesses. Such a ?handbook of coordina- tion processes could ... processes could not only facilitate interdisciplinary transfer of knowledge about
coordination, ... , it could also provide a guide for analyzing the
coordination needs in particular situations and gener- ating alternative ways of ...
and
coordination processes. Table 1 pro- vides a start in this direction. ... ?tasks? and ?resources.? To illustrate the possibilities for ana- lyzing
coordination processes, we will discuss in the remainder of this section ... we will discuss in the remainder of this section the
coordination processes listed in Table 1 and how they have been ... Resource allocation is perhaps the most widely studied of all
coordination processes. For example, it has received significant attention in economics, ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 93 tice, however, resource allocation in orga- nizations is much ... tions under which a hierarchy is a better way of
coordinating multiple actors than a market [Williamson 1975; 19851. For example, ... task assignment, too. For instance, in trying to imagine new
coordination processes in a human orga- nization, one might consider whether ...
... tation. In this sense, physical transportation can be considered a
coordination activity, since it in- volves managing a dependency be- tween ...
... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 95 19861. As our framework would sug- 2.2.3 Managing Simultaneity ...
... Identification. Even though the most commonly ana- lyzed cases of
coordination involve a se- quential process of goal selection and then ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination ... 97 Table 2. Examples of How Different Disciplines Have Analyzed
Coordination Processes
Coordination process Managing shared resources (including task assignments) Managing producer / ... dependencies between objects in the world that are managed by
coordination processes. For instance, an important part of managing the design ... among different subcomponents. At first glance, our def- inition of
coordination (as managing dependencies among activities) might appear to omit dependencies ...
... the advan- tage of greatly simplifying the analysis of a
coordinated situation. In fact, it ap- pears that all dependencies that ... In fact, it ap- pears that all dependencies that require
coordination can be treated this way. For example, dependencies among compo- ... discus- sion so far by listing examples of how common
coordination processes have been analyzed in different disciplines. The key point ... much of our discussion, is that the con- cepts of
coordination theory can help identify similarities among concepts and results in ... and where op- portunities exist to develop even deeper analyses.
Coordination Processes ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 ... illus- trate the possibilities for developing ab- stract theories of
coordination that can apply simultaneously to many different kinds of systems, ... illustrate the kind of interdisciplinary interaction that our search for
coordination theory encour- ages: the models grew originally out of designing ... steps in different jobs on a computer network. 2.3.2 Possible
Coordination Mechanisms One (highly centralized) possibility for solving this task assignment ... instance, they showed that the central- ized schemes had lower
coordination ... much less vulnera- ble to processor failures but had high
coordination costs. And decentralized hi- erarchies (?product hierarchies?) had low
coordination costs, but they had unused processor capacity which led to ... Surveys, Vol. 26. No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 8 99 tions and computer systems, they help illuminate a ... instances of coor- dination, we describe them separately here. for
Coordination 2.4.1 Group Decision Making Many
coordination processes require making decisions that affect the activi- ties of ... ways of making group decisions give rise to alter- native
coordination processes. For exam- ple, any group decision can, in principle, ... Because of the importance of group de- cision making in
coordination, , answers to questions about group decision making [Simon 1976; ... [Simon 1976; Arrow 19511 will be impor- tant for developing
coordination theory. For instance, what are the decision-mak- ing biases in ... Agarwala-Rogers 1976; Weick 19691. One obvious way of generating new
coordination processes, for example, is by considering alternative forms of communication ... a process where information needs to be trans- ferred. A
coordination framework also high- lights new aspects of these problems. For ... 1978; Cohen and Levesque 1991; Shoham 19941. 3. APPLYING A
COORDINATION 3.1 Approaches to Analyzing
Coordination Any scientific theory (indeed, any state- ment about the world) ... to some degree in any real situ- ation. In applying
coordination theory to any particular system, therefore, it may be necessary ... in designing a new com- puter system to help people
coordinate their work, ?details? about screen layout and response time may ... in the two kinds of systems. Similarly, abstract models of
coordination may include pa- rameters for things like incentives, cog- nitive ... behauorial coordina- tion theory in which careful observations of actual
coordination in human systems ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 10 1 are used to develop, test, and abstract models ... 1 are used to develop, test, and abstract models of
coordination 3.1.2 Identifying the Components of
Coordination in a Situation augment In order to analyze a situation ... augment In order to analyze a situation in terms of
coordination, , it is sometimes impor- tant to explicitly identify the ... is sometimes impor- tant to explicitly identify the components of
coordination in that situation. Accord- ing to our definition of
coordination above,
coordination means ?managing dependencies between activities.? There- fore, since activities must, ... performed by ?actors,? the definition implies that all instances of
coordination include actors performing activities that are interdepe~zdent.~ It is also ... are being met (such as minimizing time or costs). Some
coordination processes may be faster or more accurate than oth- ers, ... than oth- ers, for instance, and the costs of more
coordination are by no means always worthwhile. It is important to ... is no single ?right? way to identify these components of
coordination in a situa- tion. For instance, we may sometimes analyze ...
... [ 19841, and Mintzberg [ 19791 for related decompositions of
coordination. . situation. In analyzing
coordination in human organizations, it is often useful to simply ask ... but we, as observers, can evaluate the market as a
coordination mechanism in terms of how well it satisfies overall criteria ... this section, we de- scribe examples of how concepts about
coordination have been applied in three different areas: (I) understanding the ... tems. The early examples use very gen- eral notions of
coordination; ; the later ones are more explicit in their identifica- ... a com- prehensive list of all ways that theories of
coordination could be applied. In fact, most of the work we ... work we describe here did not explicitly use the term ?
coordination theory.? We have chosen examples, how- ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. ... the wide range of ap- plications for interdisciplinary theories about
coordination. . 3.2 Understanding the Effects of Information Technology on Organizations ... Simon 19761. One of the most important contri- butions of
coordination theory may be to help understand these possibilities bet- ter. ... possibilities bet- ter. To illustrate how the explicit study of
coordination might help with this en- deavor, we begin with a ... does not depend on any of the detailed analyses of
coordination we have seen so far in this ~ u r ... Instead, this argument starts with the simple ob- servation that
coordination is itself an activity that has costs. Even though there ... there are many other forces that may affect the way
coordination is performed in or- ganizations and markets (e.g., global competition, ... likely to significantly reduce the costs of certain kinds of
coordination [Crawford 19821. Now, using some elementary ideas from microeconomics about ... some simple predictions about the possi- ble effects of reducing
coordination costs. It is useful to illustrate these effects by analogy ...
... from using new information technologies to reduce the costs of
coordination: : (1) A ?first-order? effect of reducing co- ordination costs ... be to substitute in- formation technology for some hu- man
coordination. . For instance, many banks and insurance companies have substituted ... the 1980s and 1990s. (2) A ?second-order? effect of reducing
coordination costs may be to increase the overall amount of
coordination used. In some cases, this may over- ACM Computing Surveys, ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1. March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 103 whelm the first-order effect. For instance, in one case ... the use of more ?co- ordination-intensive? structures. In other words,
coordination structures that were previously too ?expensive? will now become more ... that they require large amounts of unplanned communica- tion and
coordination throughout an organization. However, technologies such as electronic mail and ... more effective at much larger scales. What might these new
coordination- -in- tensive structure be like? Let us consider recent work ... specific dependen- cies. Instead, it compares two pairs of general
coordination mechanisms that can manage many such dependencies: (1) market transactions ... nation structure. They conclude that by reducing the costs of
coordination, , infor- mation technology may lead to an overall shift ... tionately more use of markets-rather than internal decisions within firms-to
coordinate economic activity. This argument has two parts. First, since market ... has two parts. First, since market transactions often have higher
coordination costs than internal
coordination [Williamson 1985; Malone et al. 1987bl an overall reduction in ... al. 1987bl an overall reduction in the ?unit costs? of
coordination should lead to markets becoming more desirable in situations where ...
... cally analyze the effects on centralization of the reductions in
coordination costs enabled by IT. They conclude that IT can lead ... sense, this work can be considered a kind of ?behavioral
coordination theory.? In studies of computerization decisions in 42 local governments ... decisions. In this section, we will describe how ideas about
coordination have been help- ful in suggesting new systems, classify- ing ... systems, and analyzing how these systems are used. 3.3.1 Using
Coordination Concepts from Other Disciplines to Suggest Design ldeas One way ... the fol- lowing authors did not explicitly use the term ?
coordination theory,? they used ideas about
coordination from other dis- ACM Computing Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 105 Table 3. A Taxonomy of Cooperative-Work Tools Based on ... f subtask relationship (goal decomposition) Group decision-making Communication Example systems
Coordinator (Winograd and Flores, 1986) Information Lens (Malone, et al., 1987) ...
... oth- ers) provided a primary basis for design- ing the
Coordinator, , a computer-based cooperative-work tool. For example, the
Coordinator helps people make and keep track of requests and commitments ... Holt [1988] describes a theoretical lan- guage used for designing
coordination tools that is based, in part, on ideas about Petri ... ?CO- ordination mechanics? and has been used to design a ?
coordination environment? to help people work together on computer networks. About ... Parallel Processes 3.3.6 Summary of Examples Clearly, using ideas about
coordination from other disciplines does not provide any guarantee of developing ... feel that considering these examples within the common framework of
coordination the- ory provides two benefits: (1) it suggests that no ... previous work in vari- ous disciplines for more insights about
coordination that could lead to new coop- erative-work tools. 3.3.7 A ... in Table 3 , the framework we have suggested for
coordination provides a natural way of classifying existing cooperative-work systems according ... natural way of classifying existing cooperative-work systems according to the
coordination Some of these systems primarily empha- size a single
coordination- -related process. For instance, electronic mail systems primarily support the ... Surveys, Val 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 107 Some of the systems also explicitly support several processes. ... help identify new opportunities for cooperative-work tools. For instance, the
Coordinator focuses on supporting one part of the task assign- ment ... be possible to implement ?primitives? for a number of different
coordination- -re- lated processes in the same environment and then let ... primi- tives in various ways to help solve partic- ular
coordination problems. This is one of the goals of the Oval ... Analyzing Incentives for Using Cooperative- Work Tools Another use for
coordination theory in designing cooperative-work tools can be to help systematically ... to each other is easy compared to the difficulty of
coordinating the activities of many different proces- sors working on different ...
... Surveys. Vol. 26, No 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination - 109 processors. For instance, one interesting example of this ...
... 3.4.2 Analyzing Stability Properties of Resource Another way of applying
coordination concepts is t o help evaluate alternative Allocation Algorithms designs ... of different disciplines can contribute to answering the questions about
coordination and how theories of
coordination can, in turn, be applied to the concerns of several ... Malone and K. Crowston Table 4. Sample Applications of a
Coordination Perspective Application area Examples of analyzing Examples of generating new ... Analyzing the effects of Creating temporary ?intellectual structures and decreasing
coordination costs marketplaces? to solve specific problems. informution on firm size, ... problem-solving. As we suggested above, a central con- cern of
coordination theory should be to identify and analyze specific
coordination processes and structures. Therefore, a critical item on the agenda ... the following kinds of questions arise. 4.1 Representing and Classifying
Coordination Processes How can we represent
coordination pro- cesses? When should we use flowcharts, Petri nets, or ... coor- dination processes? For instance, can we usefully regard some
coordination ... pro- cesses as ?special cases? of others? How are different
coordination processes com- bined when activities are actually per- formed? 4.1.1 ...
... Another set of questions has to do with how generic
coordination processes really are: How far can we get by analyzing ... are: How far can we get by analyzing very general
coordination processes, and when will we find that most of the ... that most of the impor- tant factors are specific to
coordinating a particular kind of task? For example, are there general ... kind of task? For example, are there general heuristics for
coordination that are analogous to the general prob- lem-solving heuristics studied ... lem-solving heuristics studied in cogni- tive science and artificial intelligence?
Coordination Processes? 4.2 Analyzing Specific Processes At least as important as ... For example, how far can we go in analyzing alternative
coordination pro- cesses for problems such as resource allo- cation? Can ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 111 thing for other processes such as goal selection or ... are least ?expensive? in terms of produc- tion costs and
coordination costs? Which processes are fastest? Which processes are most stable ... coordi- nating people that would not be ap- propriate for
coordinating computer processors, and vice versa? What new methods for
coordinating people become desirable when human information- processing capacities are augmented ... of the research agenda for this area is to develop
coordination the- ory in the context of various different kinds of ... the following methodologies appear likely to be useful in developing
coordination theory: (1) empirically studying
coordination in hu- man or other biological systems (e.g., field studies, ... ric studies), (2) designing new technolo- gies for supporting human
coordination, , (3) designing and experimenting with new methods for
coordinating ... distributed and parallel computer systems, and (4) formal modeling of
coordination pro- cesses (e.g., mathematical modeling or computer simulation). 5. CONCLUSIONS ... set of re- search issues in the interdisciplinary study of
coordination. . However, we be- lieve they illustrate how the notion ... However, we be- lieve they illustrate how the notion of ?
coordination? ? provides a set of abstrac- tions that help unify ... organizing collective hu- man activity. APPENDIX A: PREVIOUS DEFINITIONS OF
COORDINATION ?The operation of complex systems made up of components? [National ...
... working together? [Malone and Crowston 19911. APPENDIX B: RESULTS ABOUT
COORDINATION FROM SELECTED FIELDS Even though use of the term ?coordina- ... various fields can contribute to the interdisciplinary under- standing of
coordination. . In this ap- pendix, we briefly describe examples of ... several different disci- plines. These examples focus on cases where
coordination has been analyzed in ways that appear to be generalizable ... sense, almost all of economics in- volves the study of
coordination, , with a ACM Computing Surveys, Vol 26, No. 1, ... Surveys, Vol 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 9 113 special focus on how incentives and infor- mation ... under which a hier- archy is a better way of
coordinating multiple actors than a market (see Wil- liamson [ 19751). ...
... son 19811. Operations research analyzes the prop- erties of various
coordination mecha- nisms, but operations research also in- cludes a special ... cludes a special focus on developing opti- mal techniques for
coordination deci- sions. For instance, operations research includes analyses of various ... theme in this work has involved analyzing general issues about
coordination (see Simon [ 19761, March and Simon [ 19581, Thompson ... K. Crowston terdependencies can be managed by a variety of
coordination mechanisms, such as: standardization, where predeter- mined rules govern the ... [March and Simon 1958; Gal- braith 1973; Mintzberg 19791. These
coordination mechanisms can be used to manage interdependencies, not only among ... which they have weaker interde- pendencies. Various combinations of the
coordination mechanisms, together with different kinds of grouping, give rise to ... the activities of different parts of a human body are
coordinated t o keep a person alive and healthy. Other parts ... of how the activities of different plants and animals are
coordinated to maintain a ?healthy? environment. Some of the most intriguing ... ?healthy? environment. Some of the most intriguing studies of biological
coordination involve coordina- tion among different animals in a group. For ...
The interdisciplinary study of coordinationThe Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination THOMAS W. MALONE Center for
Coordination Sczence, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 KEVIN CROWSTON ... Admznistration This survey characterizes an emerging research area, sometimes called
coordination theory, that focuses on the interdisciplinary study of
coordination. ... . Research in this area uses and extends ideas about
coordination from disciplines such as computer science, organization theory, operations research, ... A key insight of the framework presented here is that
coordination can be seen as the process of managing dependencies among ... possible by characterizing different kinds of dependencies and identifying the
coordination processes that can be used to manage them. A variety ... and tank/subtask dependencies. Section 3 summarizes ways of applying a
coordination perspective in three different domains: (1) understanding the effects of ... and Organization Interfaces; 1.2.11 [Artificial Intelligence]: Distributed Artificial Intelligence-Coherence and
Coordination; ; K.4.3 [Computers and Society]: Organizational Impacts General Terms: Design, ... Management, Theory Additional Key Words and Phrases: Computer-supported cooperative work,
coordination, ,
coordination science,
coordination theory, groupware 1. INTRODUCTION tion 1989; 1991; Bond and Gasser ... there has been a growing this work has focused on
coordination in interest in questions about how the activ- parallel and ... of complex systems can be coordi- tems, in others, on
coordination in hu- nated [Huberman 1988b; Johansen 1988; man systems, and ... 1 1 A Motivating Question 1.2 How Can We Proceed?
COORDINATION 2 1 What is
Coordination 2 2 Basic
Coordination Processes 2 3 Example. Analyzing the Task Assignment Process 2 ... the Task Assignment Process 2 4 Other Processes Needed for
Coordination 3. APPLYING A
COORDINATION PERSPECTIVE 3.1 Approaches to Analyzing
Coordination in 3.2 Understanding the Effects of Information 3.3 Designing Cooperative-Work ... Parallel 3.5 Summary of Applications 4 1 Representing and Classifying
Coordination Processes 4 2 Analyzing Specific Processes 4.3 Applications and Methodologies ... 5 CONCLUSIONS APPENDIX A: PREVIOUS DEFINITIONS APPENDIX B: RESULTS ABOUT
COORDINATION OF
COORDINATION FROM SELECTED FIELDS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS REFERENCES - OuI goal in this ... with this work. This new research area-the interdisciplinary study of
coordination- -draws on a var- iety of different disciplines including computer ...
... and IRI-8903034, and other sponsors of the MIT Center for
Coordination ACM Computing Surveys, Vol 26, No 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary ... Surveys, Vol 26, No 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 115 Science. Parts of this paper were included in three ...
... Systems. ACM, New York, 55-62. CROWSTON, K. 1991. Towards a
coordination cookbook. Recipes for multi-agent action. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT Sloan School ... conferencing. Hum. Comput. Interaction 3, 59-85. CURTIS, B. 1989. Modeling
coordination from field experiments. In Proceedings of the Confer- ence on ... AND LESSER, V. R. 1987. Using partial global plans to
coordinate distributed problem solvers. In Proceedings of the 10th International Joint ...
... Surveys, Vol. 26, No. 1, March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 117 HOARE, C. A. R. 1975. Monitors: An operating systems ... Diplans: A new language for the study and implementation of
coordination. . ACM Trans. Office Znf. Syst. 6 , 2, 109-125. ... Znf. Syst. 6 , 2, 109-125. HOLT, A. W. 1980.
Coordinator programs. Un- published Tech. Rep. Massachusetts Computer Associates, Inc., Wakefield, ... W., RAMSEY, H. R., AND GRIMES, J . D. 1983.
Coordination system technology as the basis for a programming environment. Elec. ...
... and Cooperation. Ablex, Nor- MALONE, T. W. 1988. What is
coordination the- ory. Working Paper no. 2051-88. MIT Sloan School of ... School of Management, Cambridge, Mass. MALONE, T. W. 1987. Modeling
coordination in organizations and markets. Manage. Sci. 33, 1317-1332. MALONE, T. ... Rep. no. 120. Massachusetts Insti- tute of Technology, Center for
Coordination Science, Cambridge, Mass. MALONE, T. W. AND CROWSTON, K. 1990. ... Mass. MALONE, T. W. AND CROWSTON, K. 1990. What is
coordination theory and how can it help design 115-146. wood, N.J., ...
... A report by the NSF-IRIS Review Panel for Research on
Coordination Theory and Technology. NSFF Forms and Publication Unit, National Science ... Surveys, Vol. 26, No 1. March 1994 Interdisciplinary Study of
Coordination 119 131. University of Stuttgart, Institut fur Grundlagen der Planung ...
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